The Haunting by Portgas D Ace
by silverwolfcc
Summary: Ace is dead. The whole world knows it. Smoker knows it. Smoker has no doubts about it. So why is he getting haunted by the former brat? Or is it all just a hallucination? Alternately: Ace is a pest, even when dead. / Smoker/Ace Smoker/other / Dark Elements warning (possession, etc.)


Portgas D. Ace was dead. Dead as a doornail. Dead as a four-week old corpse could possibly be. Dead like a man who'd bluffed his last bluff, and found it lacking. Dead as if the D in his name stood for that. Dead as Gol D. Roger. Dead as Whitebeard. Dead as the Age of the Sea. Definitively _dead_.

There was no mistake about that. Everyone knew he was dead. The whole world bore witness to his execution. The war that began on the day of the Summit spread flames that engulfed unpredictable far reaches of the world.

Portgas D. Ace was dead.

Smoker was sure of this as fact. He wasn't going to allow himself to go through denial about it, because that would have meant he was grieving something, and like hell was he going to waste remorse on a god-damned, forsaken-ass pirate. Portgas D. Ace was dead, and that was all that there should have been to it. Smoker had seen the hole in the corpse, seen the smiling attempt to face death the same way the Pirate King had, seen Portgas' executioner's attempts to follow through in killing and stopping Monkey D. Luffy as well, hell had technically been PART of those pursuits, and indeed, for that Smoker might have wanted the future pirate king to survive, it had nothing to do with his doubts about the state of survival of Straw Hat's older brother. Oh no, quite the opposite. If anything, killing Portgas the way Akainu did, and then trying to see to the endless massacre of all pirates for the sake of preventing possible wrongs was starting to hit an overreach in Smoker's mind.

Nevertheless, he held true to the knowledge that Portgas was dead as deeply as he held true to the knowledge that his inner conscience could lead him to living out true justice.

Which was precisely why Smoker stood in his own room, _very_ much alone, and desperately trying to keep his composure stoic as if he truly believed he was every bit alone as he KNEW himself to be. For despite knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt that Portgas D. Ace was dead, he was finding it difficult to ignore the freckled, gently grinning, visage of his former lover sitting on his bed watching Smoker light up a fresh pair of cigars.

Portgas D. Ace was dead. As dead as can be. But the one thing Smoker agreed deeply with archaeologists about, was that dead men DO in fact tell quite a bit of tales.

"I guess you can't see me," Ace reflected quietly, musing to himself, and languidly got up to walk around Smoker's room with him as the marine tried furiously to ignore him. "Mah, well, it's not like anyone else could either."

Smoker ignored this, and made extra sure not to let his ears prick at that like a dog's, and not to clench his jaw tighter or really give ANY indication that he heard. Ace knew him too well already, and if this was indeed a hallucination - as it must surely be - then it would pass. Smoker just had to ignore it until then.

"Luffy's finally off training, I guess you saw that in the papers," Ace continued talking whether he believed Smoker could hear him or not. Well, Ace had always been like that though. Stubborn brat. Smoker had indeed heard of Straw Hat's exploits in the papers, and he hadn't been the least bit surprised either, but he made sure to continue acting like Ace wasn't there, in ghost-form, hallucination, or whatever else it could be. He grabbed a seat at his desk, kicked up his heels, and pretended that he could tune Ace out. Not that he'd ever been able to tune Ace out in his life. For that matter, Smoker couldn't tune anyone out, and Ace not only knew that, but exploited it to the fullest. That was the problem with having keen hearing.

"So I don't gotta worry about him as much," Ace continued and took up a place on the blue couch in Smoker's office, laying on his chest with both his arms leaning on the arm of the couch and watching Smoker like a big giant housecat. As he'd done before, in the past. So surely that was just imagination. Smoker remembered him doing it and therefore found it likely that Ace would again. Probably. And yet, Smoker's teeth still ground on the cigars sightly trying to resist the urge to correct Portgas' grammar. Since when did Smoker even care about grammar? He didn't really, but "Don't gotta" was just _irritating_ and Smoker could already see the mental image of Portgas' grandfather punching him for saying it, and then saying something else incorrectly just as badly... tsk.

Smoker almost wanted to comment on it to Ace. To tell him that Garp would be annoyed, and how Garp was doing right now. If Ace had been alive, had actually been there, maybe Smoker would have. But while Smoker might be so far gone as to hallucinate dead pirates lounging in his office conversationally TALKING to him, he wasn't so far gone as to speak BACK to them. Yet.

Instead he ignored Ace, and stubbornly opened his newspaper to try to read and tune Ace out for real.

"Marco's a mess... of course," Smoker didn't have to look up to know the expression on Ace's face about that. The guilt of living. Hadn't Ace finally decided he deserved to be born? To live as long as he did? Faults and all. There was no sense going back on it now just because dying left as many problems for the world as living did. Or was that why Portgas remained as a ghost?

IF, indeed, he was actually a ghost, and not a hallucination on Smoker's part. Maybe Smoker needed to check his cigars a lot more carefully. He'd already replaced them several times, rolled some new sets, and thoroughly inspected his boxes in every way he could think of - just in case it was drugged, from the first time he'd caught the imaginary glimpse of -Ace- Portgas, rather. Still, maybe it was... something. Some side effect from all the devil fruits at Marineford. Or from losing the mera mera user. Whatever.

Ace's ghost sighed. "But he's holding on..." rueful toned, Smoker could internally see the expression he was CERTAIN Portgas' face held, but didn't that imply this was all a hallucination? He half wanted to check to see if his instincts matched up with the ghost face, but that would be acknowledging the presence of the ghost, and Smoker refused to do that. So instead, Smoker stubbornly insisted in his own head, that indeed, his ability to mentally conjure the correct face did imply that this was all some sort of internal hallucination on Smoker's own part, even though he didn't give a damn about the state of Marco the Phoenix's well-being.

"He has everyone else looking after him," there was a slight swishing sound as if the ghost of Ace was kicking his feet back and forth in the air looking even more childish than the twenty-year old brat should have been allowed. But all of that was memory. Probably. Or hallucination at least. Definitely. "They had to do that when I left anyway," Ace continued on, sounding slightly more cheerful as he talked himself through it.

Smoker had quietly been thinking the same thing as the ghost of Ace said aloud, so a facial muscle twitched slightly. That was proof it was a hallucination, right? Or was he just desperately trying to find proof of that to convince himself this couldn't be real? Damn it.

There was a longer pause of silence, and Smoker almost wanted to look beyond his newspaper to see if the hallucination had stopped. Yet, again, that would mean acknowledging that the hallucination had ever STARTED in the first place, and Smoker quietly, stubbornly, refused. So he didn't check, just tried to read.

Ace yawned, and Smoker couldn't even stop his ears from flicking back in trying to figure out where the ghost/hallucination was now. On his back on the couch, most likely. The damn fidgety brat had probably just rolled over. "So I guess that means you're last on my list," Ace jovially continued, and Smoker inwardly cursed. "Not that you care," the tone was wry.

Smoker froze. He wanted to punch Ace. Ghost, hallucination, or not. "_Don't_ tell me what I care about or not!" The thought bubbled like a small growl in his throat, and indeed, Smoker DID wind up growling out loud. But since it could have been at the newspaper, the ghost Ace didn't seem to take it as a sign of acknowledging Ace's presence. If Ace was a hallucination, shouldn't the hallucination know what Smoker was thinking? And in the past, Ace would never have assumed Smoker couldn't see him, if anything, the more Smoker tried to ignore Ace, the worse Portgas tried to get his attention.

Smoker put his paper down, and rubbed his temples, this was giving him a headache.

Portgas got up from the couch, quietly padded over to behind Smoker, and gently rubbed the worst spots for Smoker, slowly easing the tension away.

That was impossible. Dead men couldn't touch anything, and Ace had no physical presence like this and yet...

"Sorry," Ace's voice was softer now, and Smoker closed his eyes. He wasn't acknowledging that he could see Ace, or hear him, or feel him, not at all. It was just helping the headache and frankly, he didn't care if that was because of a ghost or not. "I didn't mean you don't care about me," Ace's voice was warm like honey in tea, or milk in coffee. It still made Smoker want to punch him. Portgas didn't have the right to act like he understood Smoker's thoughts now. He didn't have the right to be there period. And he definitely didn't get to talk to Smoker with unending audience that Smoker couldn't technically stop - at least, not by _willing_ it away with mental power alone, because god knows, Smoker kept trying to do just that.

"I meant you wouldn't care about being last on the list," Ace's tone was wry again, and although Smoker took his feet off the desk to lean over onto it with his head on his arms, he was pretty sure it wasn't the most outward acceptance of Ace's fingers working down his tense neck and shoulders. Why would it be? After all, Ace was NOT THERE.

Which was why it also didn't matter if Smoker made a tsking sound to himself in response to Ace's comment. If Ace was a hallucination, he would already know Smoker's mind, and if not, even as a hallucination, it didn't matter. Tsking to one's self at one's own mental thoughts was not insane. People were allowed to do that. So Smoker grunted. He couldn't reply, couldn't tell Portgas to go away, couldn't say he didn't care about whether Ace was dead or alive, couldn't say it did bother him to be last (because it did, but it shouldn't have, and he shouldn't want any ghostly form of Ace there at all, and mostly didn't) but he could still make quiet sounds to himself. And Smoker always did things his own way anyway, so he was going to do exactly that.

Ace knuckles felt as warm as always. That was wrong. Weren't ghosts supposed to be cold? And certainly without physical threshold there shouldn't be anything to feel. And yes, Smoker could easily say he could feel the difference between the chilly air slowly thickening with cigar smoke, and Ace's hands. And they weren't even the same as he remembered. Rougher, like Ace felt he had to try harder to be felt, more calloused, scarred and - well, Smoker could remember seeing how messed up Ace was after Impel Down, but still, could he really convince his own shoulders to adjust for that sensation to convince them of it? Then again, Smoker wasn't going to underestimate the mind's capacity for anything.

He shrugged out of his jacket and quietly hummed, rolling his neck and shoulders in a way that Portgas once said reminded him a dog. "Woof," Smoker had mockingly snarked back way back then, sending the brat into peals of laughter, as Smoker had intended. This time Ace hummed thoughtfully back but sounded more cheerful already.

"So you CAN feel that," he definitely sounded pleased with himself.

Smoker didn't say anything, just pretended to be more relaxed, and sat up to pour himself a glass of rum. On reflex he started to hand the bottle towards Ace, before firmly remembering to pretend he couldn't see anything, and sat the bottle down stubbornly on the desk where he'd been about to pass it over. He leaned back in his chair, and then to at least try to confuse Ace, or just to be stubborn with himself, Smoker roughly rubbed his own shoulders, to pretend that he hadn't felt Ace doing anything.

"Stubborn bastard," Ace smirked.

Smoker grinned quietly at that, he couldn't really avoid it. But luckily if Ace knew why Smoker was grinning, he didn't seem to know how to take advantage of it and force Smoker's hand.

"I wish I had my hat though," Ace added abruptly.

Smoker assumed the ghost brat was missing it on account of not having it the last time Smoker saw him either. There was a slight pout beneath freckled cheeks as Ace seemed to be trying to figure out how to fix the situation. If this was a dream, wouldn't the solution be simple? Same with a hallucination. Or... Smoker didn't know really. There was a lot Smoker was starting to understand he had no clue about, and most of them involved psychosis or the afterlife.

Ace leaned his chin into a palm and hopped onto Smoker's desk leaning on an elbow. "Maybe I'll steal a marine hat if I stick around. It's not like I NEED to hide... no one can see me, but it's the principle of it, I guess."

"What principle?" Smoker WANTED to ask. He had to tightly clench his jaw to refrain from asking. If he wrote it down though, that'd be even worse. Even if he tried to make it some sort of musing to himself diary page, it would still be in response to Ace, even if Ace was a fragment of his own subconscious whateverness.

Ace leaned over and started playing with Smoker's hair.

Smoker's jaw tightened even more.

Portgas looked amused. "I wish I knew what you were thinking," Ace remarked quietly, playing with Smoker's hair, and ears enough to drive Smoker crazy. If Ace had really been there, had really been this insistent in getting Smoker's attention - as he usually was - Smoker would have taken him off the desk and into his lap, and started fucking the brat by now... except that would require acknowledging the presence of someone who simply could not be there. And Smoker still refused. Part of Smoker wanted to explain just that to the hallucination. That he was trying to figure out how to get rid of him. Because at worst, maybe it WOULD end the problem. Or maybe some semi-secret hidden part of Smoker had the answer. And if Smoker kept ignoring Ace, didn't that mean maybe part of him was worried about making him go away? Which was just as bad. So really, what did Smoker have to lose in replying to himself out loud?

Only his own self-respect, and Smoker had lost that the second or third dalliance with the Whitebeard pirate. And the first. Most of it was gone by the first.

Still... part of him was reluctant to respond yet. Surely it was just memories and nostalgia mixing, and maybe part of it was the Grand Line itself. The very weather could do all kinds of crazy things, why _wouldn't_ they mess up people's senses? So it was definitely probably something more like that. Probably. Definitely. Almost definitely. Maybe.

Ace leaned forward to kiss Smoker's nose, and reflexively, Smoker pushed him back with a shove to the face.

They both blinked in confusion at the sudden contact, eyes widened, quietly stunned, but Smoker shook his head, mumbled, "Damn weather," to himself quietly as an explanation out loud, and Ace...

Portgas gave a quiet sad wry wistful grin all at once, that Smoker fervently tried to ignore how it broke his heart. Because it wasn't there. It couldn't be real. And even if it was, he wouldn't have let something that pitiful affect him. No way. "I missed you," Ace said quietly, sadly, ruefully.

Smoker didn't outwardly acknowledge it. Just quietly drank his coffee that tasted like Ace had mixed it (but that was impossible, Smoker was just hallucinating or nostalgic, or all of it, right?) and sipped the rum. He looked out towards the port window he'd left open on habit. Open for Ace, once upon a time. Open now because it was habit. Open because Ace was there, or was it just a dream? Smoker was tempted to shut the window. To be stubborn. To show Ace's ghost Smoker knew he was dead, wasn't going to be coming in through the window anymore, and Smoker no more needed to leave a window open to keep his room from becoming a smoke chamber than needed to be haunted by a dead lover.

But he was haunted, wasn't he? Even if it was his own imagination haunting him, he certainly couldn't deny that that was the case. "I miss you too, I guess," Smoker mentally thought in reply. Because that's what seeing Ace even hallucinatory - maybe ESPECIALLY if it was a hallucination, had to mean. Smoker thought.

A warm hand began rubbing Smoker's ear and earlobe again, reclaiming Smoker's direct attention. He couldn't pretend he couldn't feel it, and the ghost, or hallucination, or whatever, already knew Smoker could feel it, or at least that Smoker reacted to it, so it wouldn't ever be worth the amount of effort Smoker would have had to do to pretend he didn't feel it. Still, Smoker wondered idly why Ace was doing that. Was it to demand Smoker's attention on purpose, or just because Ace had always been in the habit of doing things like that? Maybe there were too many reasons to count.

Warm dark eyes were quietly watching him over the freckled face, and Smoker couldn't help tensing up slightly. He couldn't read Ace's expression. Was Ace trying to guess Smoker's mind still? Remembering things? Just trying to get Smoker's attention? The marine had no idea. And that made him nervous. Way more nervous than he was ever going to be willing to admit, even to himself. Ace was ever unpredictable, like a spark that traveled with the wind, Ace also had the tendency to crop up in purposely unexpected places. And the more unreadable Ace was, the more he tended to be planning something stupid.

"I love you," Ace suddenly intoned, and Smoker all but flinched. Slate grey eyes widened slightly over cigars, his mouth dropped slightly, and he had to purposely control it to try to keep it even. He was giving himself away, and that must be what Ace was looking for, Smoker was SURE of it. There was a lump in his throat Smoker refused to swallow - because that would also give him away, and he didn't trust himself to drink again without freaking out.

If this had been real...

No.

If Smoker hadn't been trying SO damn hard to prove he couldn't hear and see the pirate, he would have grabbed Ace by the throat, held him down into the desk, and _roared_ at him that Portgas had NO damn right to say shit like that now that he was gone. If...

Smoker was still plenty tempted, to be fair, but he quietly suspected that was exactly what Ace wanted. It was the kind of thing Ace always wanted. Fucking brat. Always getting under Smoker's skin, under Smoker's hands, under Smoker period- fuck.

Smoker rubbed his own face roughly. He knew it was flushed more than normal, he could FEEL the heat in his cheeks, from anger and embarrassment, from hurt and fury, and shame, and god DAMN it, he wanted to punch Ace off his desk, or just punch him in the face for the hell of it. He would have too, except punching the air was too Garp-like for even Smoker to be comfortable with. He wanted to grab the red beads around Portgas' neck, yank the brat forward, and twist the beads to choke him. How the fuck did Portgas even still have them on? They'd broken when Sakazuki killed him. And Portgas himself said he couldn't find a way to get his hat like this.

It made no sense.

NONE of this made any sense. Not the fact that Smoker was hallucinating him, not the fact that Ace plainly dropped bombshells like that like it was nothing, and whether or not Smoker wanted it or hated it, he had no idea. Nor did Smoker have any way of telling the difference either. And maybe it didn't matter. Whether he wanted it to happen, or hated it, it wouldn't make it go away.

Smoker slowly calmed his heart rate back down, although he still wanted to enact as much violence on the pirate as he could stand. As they both could stand. And then maybe some extra to punish them both. Ace for wanting it in the first place, and Smoker for allowing the fucked up everything to happen.

Carefully, Smoker took some slow deep breaths, and Ace leaned back, away from the chair and the marine sitting in it. "You can't hear me, but I hope you move on anyway," Ace said quietly. Smoker wanted to murder him even more. He wondered if seastone would affect the ghost the same way. Part of him wondered if that mattered, and whether he should try to choke the moron ghost with his jitte anyway. If he REALLY thought the hallucination wasn't there, Smoker would have gone through with it - because then the only person he had to justify it to would be himself, and he already knew his own justifications. So that was another problem. Smoker no longer thought that the hallucination wasn't real. Thus if he treated it like it was real, then the hallucination might know Smoker was affected. This whole thing was a problem.

He wanted to rage at Ace. To the tell the pirate that there was nothing to move on from, that Smoker would do what he wanted, WHO he wanted, when he wanted, and when he was good and ready, and that if he refrained from anything, it certainly wasn't out of misplaced loyalty to a dead god damned brat of a pirate who should never have had a single piece of Smoker's life to begin with. Most of Smoker was just furious with Ace sacrificing himself again. Even in death. Even when that got him killed in the first place. Even when the one time Ace could afford to be selfish (in his own thoughts? Own afterlife?) he was feigning some fucking noble martyrdom attitude. Smoker wanted to flippantly piss Ace off, act like he never refrained from anything on account of the pirate or not, and like hell was he going to with Ace DEAD.

A tiny part of him was twitchy at all of this. Did Ace know how Smoker would feel in response to something like that? Was he trying to make Smoker rebel against him, rage at him, and for what? But would a dead man who thought he couldn't be seen bother manipulating anyone?

Smoker clenched his jaw tightly.

Part of him was just so damn mad at Portgas for saying that. For always, ALWAYS neglecting his own emotional or mental welfare, EVEN IN DEATH. For the arrogance of thinking he knew what would be better for Smoker than Smoker would himself. For thinking that he needed to tell Smoker, or say it for closure's sake, and-

It was too much, there was too damn much.

"Because _you've_ moved on so well?" Smoker growled sarcastically, out loud, his eyes flashing furiously like thunderbolts.

Something about being lectured to about -MOVING ON- from a god damned ghost no less, or at least the internal hallucination by himself of part of himself telling him to move on just pissed Smoker off to no end. The hypocrisy of it!

Ace blinked, taken aback, and paused, considering that over. Then he scrunched up his face, and tilted his head. "Are you talking to me?" he asked.

Smoker sighed, and lowered his head back into one of his own hands. He could reply, and address his hallucination, and have a discussion with it, sans the denial that pissed him off so much in Portgas specifically BECAUSE he knew how much of it Smoker himself had... Or he could pretend that random remark was simply well-timed out of coincidence, and continue on like before. How many times in the past had he just tried to keep everything the same? How many times with Portgas had he embraced the denial of pretending things weren't real, and didn't matter? Why bother changing that status quo this time?

The marine said nothing, just waited for Ace's own response. Whether it was a hallucination or not, Ace, even Smoker's own imaginary cobbled-together-from-memories Ace, would almost always speak before Smoker was ever forced to. Why would this time be any different?

Ace chuckled quietly and shook his head, maybe to himself, maybe to Smoker. It didn't matter. "I guess it doesn't matter. Maybe you can only see pieces of me, and maybe you can't." Smoker tensed all over again. If Ace thought Smoker was trying to ignore him, then Ace was going to redouble his efforts to MAKE Smoker notice him, and Smoker KNEW it. It'd happened before, and Smoker couldn't imagine DEATH somehow doing anything other than exacerbating just that. "You're right though," Ace continued with a soft bitter laugh that did nothing to ease Smoker's tension. "I mean why else would I be here?"

No shit.

Smoker snorted quietly to himself in annoyance.

"I mean, I do love you," Ace paused. Smoker debated the merits of ripping his desk up from the wood deck it was bolted into in order to dump the ghost on his ass. While Smoker very much doubted it could cause brain damage in a ghost - especially since Ace probably didn't have enough functioning brain cells to damage in the first place. But, unfortunately doing so would mean letting the ghost call the shots, and tearing up his own desk just over a hallucination would be a whole new low in throwing a tantrum. It was tempting though. "But I guess... really..." Ace got quiet and wistful, "I just need a friend."

Smoker's eyes deadened. He was going to ignore this even if it killed him.

"And not like Marco, Jinbe, or Luffy, or even Sabo, you know?" Smoker chomped his cigars furiously. No, he did not know. Nor did he care to. "I mean like..." Ace leaned over until he was leaning on Smoker again, one hand playing with one of Smoker's ears and the hand that started off leaning on the desk for support slowly slid up Smoker's thigh. It was too warm to be fake, too cool to be a memory, and Smoker wanted to shove him off again, but even that would require admitting he knew what was going on. And admitting that it was there. "You," Ace quietly mumbled hotly into Smoker's ear, before nuzzling it and running his hand down Smoker's chest.

Smoker repeated "ignore" in his own head like a mantra that would somehow save him. Ignore, ignore, ignore, ignore, ignore... hell, what was there to even ignore? Nothing there, because Portgas was dead, and it'd never really been a big deal in the first place, after all.

Ace nipped the shell of Smoker's ear, and Smoker quietly leaned his head towards the mouth slightly. Not like he could stop it anyway. And besides, everyone had sexual fantasies sometimes. It was fine. He just hoped he could keep himself from reacting much beyond that, which wasn't easy with Ace's hands roaming all over his chest, and legs. God damn brat. Even in death, there was no peace from him.

"It's like..." Ace nibbled Smoker's neck, and throat absentmindedly. Many many times in the past, Smoker had wished that Portgas was able to express his thoughts without also molesting the marine at the same time, and yet no time in the past had Smoker wished so fervently as this one. Either because the past times influenced and created this one as cobbled together by memory, or simply because being molested by a ghost pirate was fucking with Smoker's head in more ways than one. Ace bit Smoker's bottom lip and tugged it softly between his teeth. Smoker froze stiffly, and his eyes widened in a way he couldn't prevent. That couldn't be a hallucination... MAYBE a dream, but... hallucination? Could it? "You'd probably say I'm being too selfless, ignoring what I want."

Well, wasn't he? Wasn't that exactly it? Ace was often too selfless to be a pirate, and too reckless to be anything else. "And maybe you're right," Ace mumbled softly into Smoker's neck, warm breath coasting over the pale flesh, even though Smoker KNEW it couldn't be real. If all this wasn't so impossible, Smoker would have laced a hand through floppy black strands of hair by now, coaxed the god damn lover into some more complacency and shown him how to REALLY fuck someone. But again, that would require some sort of acquiescence to meeting his hallucination half-way, and Smoker refused to negotiate with his own addled senses, period. Instead, he folded his arms beneath the pirate, leaned back in his chair with his feet on his desk again, and closed his eyes, focused on willing it all away.

"But that IS what I want," Ace mumbled sadly, biting Smoker's stiff shoulders. If the shoulder rub had relaxed them before, Ace's words were undoing all of that. Ace pulled back to look at Smoker, and Smoker lazily made the mistake of peering back at the brat curiously. "I mean... if it was reversed, wouldn't you say that too?"

Smoker's stomach tightened with cold fury and he wasted no time in punching Portgas halfway across the room with one single furious blow.

"Ow ow, god, FUCK, that isn't fair!" Ace scrambled off the floor, rubbed his jaw with a scowl and dusted off his shorts glaring at Smoker. "How come you can punch me but don't seem to notice anything else?!"

Smoker couldn't help the slightly arrogant smirk he shot in Ace's direction as the marine got out of his chair and moved to his bed to take nap. Ace rubbed his jaw and thought it all over some more before following Smoker along. "CAN you feel me?" Ace peered at Smoker and climbed halfway on top of him. Smoker almost nodded. He felt it was obvious enough already, but if he did that, then Ace would figure out Smoker could hear him as well, and that would be another can of worms, so Smoker just stubbornly closed his eyes again, to ignore Ace as best as he could.

Ace was unusually silent for a little bit. Maybe being dead, or a figment of Smoker's imagination had calmed him down somewhat. Maybe. Or maybe being ignored was having that effect. That thought made Smoker's stomach clench again. Stupid brat, he didn't HATE Portgas... he didn't want Portgas to hate his existence either. Even if it wasn't anymore. But finally as Smoker stubbornly rolled to his side, again, pretending he couldn't feel Ace at all, Portgas curled up against him like a giant cat, and snuggled against Smoker's chest. Portgas was dead, Smoker reminded himself insistently all over again for the four thousandth time or so, and therefore, he was NOT feeling soft black hair against his skin, or breathing in his campfire scent, or feeling the warm contained body next to him. Not real, just hallucination.

"I'm sorry for dying," Ace said quietly to no one but himself.

Smoker gave him a hard tight hug at that and stubbornly refused to let go. Hallucination or not, would Ace really be there if Smoker had actually wanted Ace dead? He doubted it anyway. And as far as hauntings went, Ace blamed himself more than Smoker was willing to accept. "Idiot," Smoker growled, roughly chiding both Ace and himself. Ace for blaming himself still, and Smoker for indulging the hallucination. One of those.


End file.
